A group of ten men got out of a New Orleans jail on Friday, possibly with help from jail staff. The Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office warned that these men are armed and dangerous.
Since then, three of the prisoners have been caught.
The Louisiana State Police said they caught Kendell Myles in the French Quarter, a popular tourist spot less than 3 miles from the Orleans Justice Center. Officials say they found him hiding under a car in the garage of a hotel. It is alleged that Myles tried to kill someone in the second degree.
Police say that Robert Moody, a second prisoner, was caught late Friday night. More details about Moody’s arrest weren’t made public right away.
As of late Friday night, the police said Dkenan Dennis had been caught near Chef Menteur Highway.
“We have made progress,” Inspector General of Orleans Anne Kirkpatrick told the press. “Three of the escapees are now being held.” We are following up on the others.”
“People are chatting. “Thank you,” the officer said, adding that one of the arrests was based on a tip from Crime Stoppers. “The second person that we got into custody was actually an actual Crime Stopper tip.”
At first, police said 11 had gotten away, but they didn’t know that one had just been moved to a different cell.
Authorities say that eight prisoners are still on the run. Four of them are men charged with second-degree murder: Corey Boyd, Lenton Vanburen, Jermaine Donald, and Derrick Groves.
Major Silas Phipps of the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office said that some of the prisoners started messing with a locked cell door at 12:22 a.m. Friday and were seen entering the cell about 20 minutes later on surveillance video.
Sheriff Susan Hutson of Orleans Parish said the 10 prisoners got out of the jail at 1:01 a.m. through a wall behind a toilet. Phipps said they then left the property through a loading dock door and climbed the outer wall while making blanket forts to protect themselves from the barbed wire. They had a clear way to get to the train tracks and then the interstate.
The sheriff’s office showed security video they found while looking into the breach. It showed the prisoners slamming open a cell door, running from the loading dock, and crossing Interstate 10 without stopping. Authorities say that their orange jail outfit was left behind in a neighborhood close to I-10.
A press meeting held by Hutson on Friday said, “We have evidence that these prisoners got help in their escape from within our department.”
“It’s almost impossible — not completely — but almost impossible for anybody to get out of this facility without help from the outside,” said Hutson.
When the Orleans Justice Center did a regular headcount on Friday around 8:30 a.m. local time, Major Silas Phipps of the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office said the guys were missing.
The sheriff’s office said that by 9:30 a.m., the US Marshals, the Louisiana State Police, and Probation and Parole were all told. The cops in New Orleans said they were told at 10:30 a.m.
“These folks that were able to get out did so because of defective locks on the cells,” said Hutson.
“There’s no way people can get out of this facility without some lapse,” he said. “We intend to find out exactly what happened.”
An official said that they are looking into how the breach happened because the prisoners must have gotten help or at least something that let them get away.
The sheriff’s office said that three employees have been put on administrative leave until the probe is over.
Police say that there were four managers and 36 staff members at the jail when the prisoners got out. When the breach happened, there was no deputy on the pod where the prisoners were living, and the civilian worker who was supposed to watch over the pod “had actually stepped away to grab food” and didn’t know the prisoners had gotten away, Phipps said.
They told Phipps that they didn’t know how long the citizen had been gone.
Hutson said that the event made it clear that the jail needs to be fixed right away and more staff needs to be hired. He said that just the locks will cost $5.2 million.
In an alert message, Hutson said that the sheriff’s office is working with local, state, and federal police on a “full-scale search operation.”
Anne Kirkpatrick, the superintendent of police in New Orleans, said that a “group of people” who were thought to be victims of the prisoners were taken from their homes right away and “taken to safety.” She asked people who saw the prisoners commit crimes to do the same.
Kirkpatrick said it’s “more than likely” that the prisoners got help and changed clothes.
She told reporters, “We don’t want panic, but we do want people to be careful.”
That’s what the sheriff said about the escape: “very serious and unacceptable.”
“We are launching a full investigation to determine how this escape occurred, including reviewing facility protocols, staff performance and physical security measures,” sheriff said.
He promised that anyone who helped the prisoners get away would be held responsible.
There is a prize of up to $5,000 available from the FBI for information that leads to the arrest of any of the escaped prisoners. The FBI said it is helping with the search.
As an added bonus, Crimestoppers of Greater New Orleans said it would pay $2,000 for each person they catch.
During a tense news briefing Friday evening, Hutson asked when the breach happened.
“Why did it happen just right now, right in the middle, as we’re getting ready to start this sheriff’s race?” She said. “This seems very fishy. They got help, that much we know. We’ll show you that they got help. This was planned out. There’s more to it than meets the eye.